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you would have been fine if you were on a horse instead of a plane, but only if you treated the horse well. if you're mean to the horse, obviously it's going to try to buck you off somehow. horses can tell a good person when they see one; you aren't likely to fall off a horse unless it wants you to.

Curt, I was probably around 13 and barely over 5 feet tall at the time. I was looking at how high off the ground I was. The horse knew I wasn't comfortable up there. Today, if I'm driving through a rural area and I see one peering over a split rail fence at the road, I sometimes pull over and see if the horse will let me pet it, first by letting it sniff the back of my hand. They typically stay at the fence and let me pet them. They've got some big teeth, though.

There is no there, Placenta is a city in Orange County, CA. Actually, it's Placentia, but my mind sometimes wanders over to calling it Placenta, CA

I got a call from my principal to inform me that my contract has been cut by the technology department at district from 200 to 187 days; I will lose a full months salary. No, not lose, cause I didn't misplace it. No, it's been taken from me, stolen. And by the technology department?! What the Fuck?! I don't work for them. Hell, I don't even teach their subjects, I teach graphic design and animation. It's just another case of district not knowing what the hell their teachers do. Those extra days are so I can take care of Web Site support and print posters for returning teachers, print posters for all the stupid professional development classes that district teaches.

I got permission from my principal to call up HR, but he didn't answer. I left a message, and I'm sending an email. I hate these kind of fights. Fights where you don't know what the outcome will be, but you know what it HAS to be. FML.

Sarah, sorry to hear that. From people I know who work in school districts, it's sort of the same thing. Love the work. Hate the bureaucracy and the politics.

Saw this on my homepage yesterday "Modeling Mogul Dies." It needed no name. I knew it would be John Casablancas, and it was. He launched the Cindy Crawfords and others of that era. He was sort of a Spanish Hugh Hefner-type mover and shaker. I don't know if he came from money, but looked like he would be rich. Some people sort of do.

The reason I bring this up is because he had a link to architecture. He had worked at an architectural firm for a couple of years and thought it was "too slow," according to an article I once read in the doctor's waiting room or somewhere. For all I know, it could have been preceded by an architecture degree. He was only 70. That's 5 years past the beginning of Medicare age, so he died young. He was living in Miami, but traveling to Rio for cancer treatments. He died in Rio.

Sarah, I'm starting to learn about working for a budget-minded bureaucracy myself. My impulse is always to say "yes" to pretty much anything, but then I'm told by my superiors I'm not allowed to do that because it's not coming from the right budget. So then nothing gets done. So no one is happy, and it feels like no one is steering the ship. Makes me miss self-employment, when there was no one to blame, or ask permission of, but myself.

I hope you get your situation worked out. Sounds very very very frustrating.

Back to an earlier topic: I have to weigh in to say there's nothing wrong with having a C-section or epidural. Obviously fewer drugs and interventions tend to be "better", but the end goal is a healthy baby and woman, and whatever means have to be taken to get there don't really matter at all.

Sarah, sorry to hear that, it isn't right. You should be a self employed educator like me! Then you can do whatever you want AND collect all the gossip about all the schools and how they bureautrasize everything up.

We have three or four budgets in my corner of tge Uni. They all have different rules about what and when we can do. Luckily we have staff to deal with the crazy ass paper work. Am sure they are going crazy managing the nonsense. Cool thing is they actually make it their job to get what we need and want from the system and don't just punch the clock. It makes huge difference.

Architecture budgets are much more clear but also a lot smaller. Makes it just as hard to get things done the way we want. Except we have fewer excuses since its all our doing one way or another.

Every July 25th is another year that the Italian luxury liner "Andrea Doria" is no longer, and lies at the bottom of the ocean. Essentially, this was as freaky as a mid-air collision, though it was a collision at sea. The "Andrea Doria" had crossed the Atlantic from Italy and was due in New York early the following morning. She was off of Nantucket, in severely foggy conditions, at about 11 pm and people were in its ballrooms and probably getting ready for the midnight buffet. The "Stockholm" was outbound from New York en route to Scandinavia. The culpability has been a lingering question for decades. It is known that the "Stockholm" had its radar set at 1/3 the scale it should have been (15 miles instead of 5) and that a 26 year old was temporarily running the bridge. When the bright lights of both ships appeared, the "Andrea Doria" swerved to avoid the Stockholm, was broadsided, and the reinforced bow of the "Stockholm," designed to handle icy conditions, impaled the "Andrea Doria." The ship was designed to stay afloat with the loss of one water tight segmented compartment, but the collision apparently tore into two water tight compartments. Though the "Andrea Doria" sank the following morning, at about 10 am, it quickly began taking on water and listing. Half of her lifeboats were not usable because of its pronounced lean. The Italian liner sent out a distress signal and nearby vessels, including some belonging to the U.S. military, came to help. The most important helper, in terms of capacity, was the French liner "Ile de France." Already further out into the Atlantic some 3 to 4 hours away and steaming toward Europe, the captain of the "Ile de France" unselfishly turned his ship around back toward the collision, despite some worries about getting embroiled in the foggy conditions. The fog had lifted. The "Ile de France" was able to lower all of her lifeboats and picked up at least 800 people from the "Andrea Doria" and sailed back to New York. The "Stockholm" also took many passengers from the sinking Italian liner and returned to New York. To date, this has been the largest rescue operation at sea. The number of deaths were relatively few, given the gravity of the event, with about 46 people on the "Andrea Doria" and about 5 people on the "Stockholm," mostly at the impact zones on both ships. The passenger accounts are vivid. For many, they were emigrating to America with their families, and literally left with the shirts on their backs. All of their belongings, typically allowed in steamer trunks, were in the baggage holds of the sinking ship. Italian Line lost its flagship. The decorated captain of the "Andrea Doria," not even 60 and a lifelong sailor, never returned to the sea.

Today, the wreck of the "Andrea Doria" is considered the Mount Everest of dives. Even if it lies in the Atlantic Ocean, it is at a depth of 240 feet, in the Nantucket Shoals. Not every diver who descends onto the wreck of the "Andrea Doria" makes it, because of the compression and decompression issues, the wreck which is falling apart and into which people go too far into the bowels of the liner, not to mention having to brave hazardous marine life.

A lot of elderly people remember seeing this from the TVs in their living rooms. Planes circled the wreck and sequentially captured photos of the sinking, until the liner disappeared under the water. One photographer won an award for his work.

So then, if you wonder why an Andrea Doria survivor got the apartment in NY instead of Kramer, Costanzo, and company on "Seinfeld," now you know why.

ya da yada... the guy is a scumbag....... and it was a scumbag post....so sorry...but reality sometimes creeps into our life, by guys like Wiener.... I wonder where his backing money is coming from....BiLL CLINTON....biting my cheek...shit it couldn't be....but he and Hillary have some much money to toss away.... and well. Please if anyone can be rational about this please step up to the plate. If you can't I may have to consider a retirement package as a political....somewhat.

Everyone would be much happier if they cut the BS media out of their lives.

It's not news, it's not good, it's not important and for the most part it's not even true. And if it is there isn't a damn thing you can do about it except get upset. So why bother?

Better to be positive and responsible in your life, relationships and activities, and create the world you want to live in. I don't want anything to do with the other one. Better they they choke to death on their own bile in a vacuum that we create for them.

Years ago, when I was more religious than I am now and before the internet existed at every workstation, I gave up news media for Lent. It was a calm lovely 6 weeks. I read a novel instead of the newspaper during lunch, I listened to music instead of NPR in the mornings, I avoided TVs in public places. Lovely. And the world didn't fall apart while I didn't pay attention, hey!

s-d-d: I'll step up to the plate. I dislike politics to the point that I abstain from voting at times.

Anthony Weiner: is NOT going to be the mayor of NYC - his backing has dropped from 25% to 16% as a result of this. He's a geek, too. I guess that's why he needs to extracurricular stuff, to validate himself.

The Clintons: an odious pair, and I knew it from the first time I heard them speak and, as a Dem, I should have been enthused. His nasal voice is irritating and he seemed more at home on a car lot in Little Rock with one foot up on the bumper. Little would you know this guy was a Rhodes Scholar. As for the wife, 3 words: marriage of convenience. She turned a blind eye to Monica Lewinsky and his philandering because she had her own agenda and being part of a power couple makes the going easier.

Jim McGreevey: get this, he went to the seminary after leaving the governor's spot in NJ, but an Episcopal one, as all "displaced" Catholics do, like the Catholic Cuban priest who got caught snuggling with his girlfriend on Miami Beach. McGreevey's bid for the priesthood was rejected.

Arnold Schwarzengger: two in the oven ... concurrently, and I ain't talking twins. Need I say more?

John Ensign: clean cut veterinarian turned politician for the state of Nevada, brought down by an affair with his secretary, aide, or someone in his circle, thus eyewash over his nuclear family.

Not really Curt, I like(d) Gerald Ford, Bush I, John McCain, Gov. Jerry Brown (even though he went to Berkeley AND was training to be a priest), ex-Gov. Mario Cuomo, and Obama (though his timing couldn't have been worse).

To those I dislike(d), I need to add Ronald Reagan, GWB, and Mitt Romney, especially the latter.

I don't watch any news, it's best that way. Actually watched some news yesterday, I can't believe people watch it everyday. It repeats itself and is all delivered in annoying little snippets. I especially can't handle when they have a ticker. My OCD and hyperlexia kick in and I just read and don't comprehend while watching (now subliminally delivered) clips from the latest airplane crash. NOT HEALTHY!.

Great Donna.....you need to have him invite you over to preview his art collection....or have him over to buy a work by the Mr. Liberty.....Mr. Donna....just does not sound right. Anyhow enjoy a great evening of music and humor.